Richard Arnold: US Correspondent on the economic policies of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris

Money is the topic of the day in the US Election. 

Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have both revealed their economic policy. 

Trump has announced that should he return to office, he’ll appoint Elon Musk to head of a Government Efficiency Commission, tasked with conducting a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government. 

Kamala Harris on the other hand, is talking about sharply increasing incentives for new small businesses and easing the tax burden on the middle class, to try close some of the gap between the rich and poor in the United States. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It'stightside Richard Donald Happy Friday. Oh money my campaign trial
updat us.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Well, it's decades ago of course when Clinton A. James
Carvill coined the phrase it's the economy stupid when talking
about presdential politics. Here, not much has change. Money is
the topic of this day, and Trump just announced that
if he gets back in he will name Elon Musk
as an economic czar to review the entire government everything.
Elon Musk, which is man in the world, is the

(00:26):
head of a government efficiency commission to take a look
at everything the government does, says Trump. Of that idea,
create a.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Government Efficiency Commission task with conducting a complete financial and
performance audit of the entire federal government and making recommendations
for drastic reforms need to do. It can't go on
the way we are now. And Elon, because he's not

(00:56):
very busy, has agreed to hit that task force.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
So Elon for Boss of the world. So that should
set up a little debate as to the rest of
Trump's speech to the Economic Club of New Yorkshire. Time ago,
it was all about giving more tax cuts to the
wealthy and raising taris. Meantime, Kamala Harris is talking about
sharply increasing incentives for new small businesses and easing the
tax burden on the middle class. So rich versus poor

(01:22):
longer dynamic in American politics since the days of you know,
Canugie and Rockefeller and Vanderbilts and the rest of the
so called Robert Baron's at the turn of the twentieth century.
Kamala Harris says, all this, the tariffs, the deportations, the
ever growing corporate tax cuts will cause economic chaos.

Speaker 4 (01:38):
He intends to cut off federal programs that give loans
to small businesses. He plans to give billionaires massive tax cuts,
and to cut corporate taxes by over a trillion dollars
even as they pull in record profits.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Well, Golden Saxy Financial services Company and investment Bank has
come out today siding with Harris. Here's what they say.
Quote with Trump, the hit to growth from tariffs and
tighter immigration policy would outweigh the positive fiscal impulse. As
to Harris, they say, quote new spending and expanded middle
income tax credits would slightly more than off set lower
investment due to higher corporate tax rates. So that's perhaps

(02:20):
a little surprising from some on Wall Street, where the
Dow has been on a bit of a slide of late,
as we've seen. As for inflation, it's been really a
desperate battle in recent months to try to bring inflation down,
and that has sent interest rates to sky high levels,
making cars and homes unaffordable for many folks, and even
raising grossy prices. Gold And says increased tarifts on things
like auto imports from China Mexico when the EU would

(02:43):
significantly raise core inflation, while the shift away from federal
health and education programs would significantly add to the economic
woes of poorer states, especially southern states in this country,
which benefit way, way more than the wealthier states here
when it comes to federal programs.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
And then as regards election and what Merrick Garland was
saying yesterday at the Dog on top of this, uh.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
I don't know, but it's interesting, isn't it. They say
that more than ever, Putin's in a Circle has been
trying to influence the elections here. The US Attorney General,
Merrick Garland says Putin Aide set up phony websites meant
to look like legitimate news outlets, which then carried Russian
propaganda opposing Biden and the war in Ukraine.

Speaker 5 (03:22):
These websites were designed to appear to American readers as
if they were major US news sites like the Washington
Post or Fox News, but in fact they were fake sites.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
He says, this is more electoral interference than we have
seen before from Moscow.

Speaker 5 (03:40):
It's an acceleration of and it's an increased sophistication.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
So that's the headline. I didn't need to spend a
lot of money on it either. It was a budget
around ten million dollars US. But the US now has
sees thirty two internet domains which were spun out of
a Tennessee based content creation company which posted nearly two
thousand fake videos in English, and then they were intended

(04:05):
to amplify divisions within this country's political scene. Not hard
to do. One unnamed contributor with two point four million
YouTube followers received four hundred thousand US dollars a month
for making four videos a week. Another contributor was paid
one hundred thousand bucks per video. Meantime, vladim me Putin
has just made an appearance where he has spoken of
the American presidential campaign, saying his favorite, if I may

(04:26):
say so, says Putin, was the incumbent President Biden, but
he recommended that his supporters support Miss Harris, said Putin,
adding quote, so we will do the same. Commentators noted
that Putin was smiling, grinning widely as he said this
bit of a joker is rightly.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
All right, have a good weekend. We'll see you on Monday,
just before we live. By the way, the Harris campers agreed.
Apparently the weirdest thing on this debate. They've agreed to
the muted micro rule. I thought they'd agreed to all
the rules of the previous debate and then they decided
they wouldn't agree, and now they've decided they well agree.
More probably more important, Biden's expected to announce, by the way,

(05:02):
that he's blocking a takeover of US steel maker by
Japanese company. A huge deal. It's fifteen billion dollar deal.
They announced it a while back. In fact, it was
announced last year. Nippon Steel and US Steel they were
going to get together. It would create one of the
world's largest steel companies outside of China. Investors loved it.
It was going to save the company because the US
Steel's in a pile of pain. Not that the unions

(05:24):
can see that. They're up in arms now, so Biden's
going to block it. The shares are down. Trump and
Harris actually would block it as well, so watch for
that one in the next day or so.

Speaker 2 (05:33):
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